I love coming up with ideas for our clients and bringing them to life

Sam Dyer - Associate, Brand Identity and Design

On my first day of art college I was handed a copy of a design book called ‘A Smile In The Mind’ by The Partners. We were told there and then that the standard of work in this book was our yard stick and if we ever come close to doing work as good as this, then we will have done well! I found 'A Smile In The Mind' incredibly inspirational and it represents the time that the penny really did drop for me; I understood how using ideas in design will engage a viewer much, be more memorable, essentially more effective design.

After leaving college 5 years later I was incredibly lucky to actually work for The Partners where I learnt loads and soaked up everything from the amazing designers around me. To this day, the fundamental principles of 'A Smile in the Mind' effect the way I work every day. Every project starts with idea generation away from a computer and that desire to create an idea really drives me to do the best possible job and come up with something original.

An example of how this way of working breeds better results is with the recent fund raising leaflet The House produced for Julian House. The brief was to challenge perceptions of homelessness and the idea we came up with was to initially show a small section of 3 images (a bottle, a spoon and a glove). The viewer is lead to immediately think cider, heroin and wooly glove when in fact, when revealed, the images are a bottle of bike wash, a chefs spoon and a falconry glove. These items represent the ways that Julian House are helping their clients by helping them into work like employment at their local bike shop and giving them life changing experiences like falconing. It’s powerful stuff, and that is what I love. The power of how design and a great idea can have such an impact.